Managed systems may be of any kind or classification or combination of kinds and classifications including, but not limited to: computer software, computer software objects, computer hardware, computer operating systems, computer applications, computer communications, computer processing, computer data storage and/or access and/or retrieval, nodal or network management systems, computer networking, neural and/or fuzzy computer implementations and/or applications, systems where the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle must be considered (e.g., integrated circuit systems and molecular, atomic and subatomic systems and experiments), computer graphic design, communication systems employing any method or medium, electrical, mechanical, physical, chemical, manufacturing, electromechanical, electro-physical, electrochemical, economic, financial, business, accounting, organizational, biological, sociological, political, psychological, medical, experimental systems of any and all kinds, observational, data collection, expert systems, artificial intelligence systems, navigational, flight, military, surveillance, theoretical (including computer modelling), or any other such system, existing now or in the future.
An entity of a managed system is a portion, division, or constituent of the whole that is separate either in reality or in thought only. Entities of a system can be modelled as sets of a universal class of the system.
A class is a collection of members. For example, the class of software options in a particular software system is made up of all software options in the system. Thus, a particular class may be specified by either listing all of its members or by stating some condition of membership. For example, the class of software options in a particular software system may be specified either by listing all such options (e.g., by name or code number) or by stating that "all software options in the software system belong to the class of software options".
Identity of classes is identity of membership not identity of specifying conditions. It is important to note that, while class inclusion is transitive, class membership is not. For example, "options" can be considered a class of software. Individual options are members of the class "options". But, individual options, although included in the class software are not a class of software as, if an option is added, the number of classes of software does not increase.
Hierarchical relationships are required, both in reality and in Class Theory, or absurdities result in attempting entity management. Propositional calculus requires that, for every statable condition, there be a class of entities that satisfy that condition. This Principle of Comprehension can only be met, so far as is known, by placing entities to be managed in class hierarchies with the universal class U at a tier zero and sets on the other tiers. A set is a class that is itself a member of some class.
For crisp logic, set membership function values (m.sub.F) are either yes (m.sub.F =1) or no (m.sub.F =0). For fuzzy logic, membership function values lie in a range (0.ltoreq.m.sub.F 1), with the equalities reducing fuzzy logic to crisp logic. It is important to realize that m.sub.F is not a probability value.
Entities can have diverse intrinsic natures and yet belong to the same system. For example, both hardware and software entities make up a digital computing system. Entities of entities are sets at a lower hierarchical level than simply entities. This hierarchical classification can continue for any system until the lowest tier of sets that it is reasonable or necessary to consider is reached. To simplify discussion, any system may be considered an entity, i.e., an entity which includes all other entities.
For example, a software system of a digital computer can be considered to be made up of applications. Each application in turn can be considered to be made up of code modules. Three hierarchies are to be managed here: the system, the applications and the code modules.
Managed systems comprise an assemblage or combination of entities forming a complex unitary whole, either in reality or in thought only. Any such system can be represented or modelled as a universal class which may be crisp (i.e., with precisely defined members) or fuzzy (i.e., where membership is imprecisely defined to varying degrees).
Many systems have a high degree of complexity, characterized by very complicated, intricate, or involved arrangements and interrelationships of entities on all hierarchical tiers. These arrangements and interrelationships may be difficult to understand and manage. Moreover, most systems requiring management are dynamic not static and are often vigorously active, characterized by continuous or frequent characteristic or parametric churn on all tiers. Depending upon the nature of the system, such churn can be disruptive if not properly managed. As part of the churn for some systems, sets on all tiers can appear, disappear, unite or intersect with other sets, migrate to other tiers, or acquire or lose members. Members can also have or develop imprecise membership properties, causing sets to mutate from crisp to fuzzy, taking the system class from crisp to fuzzy as well.
The management of fuzzy systems is increasing in importance in communications, for example, where diverse intravendor and intervendor product lines and products are being melded into fuzzy systems to provide "one stop shopping plug and play" capability for consumers. Systems are fuzzy when the membership functions of any of their parts or elements (entities) are indefinite to any degree.
Systems and each of their entities have fixed built-in characteristics. Characteristics are distinctive and proper activities or actions that reflect the intrinsic nature of each entity, or of the system itself. Examples of characteristics would be the inputs and outputs of an object in a class of object oriented computer software code modules.
At any given time, the characteristics of each entity (and, as noted, the system is considered an entity) are modified by parameters attributable to that entity. Parameters determine, at any given time, such things as the information content, state, or activities of an entity, but do not determine or affect the intrinsic nature of the entity. Parameters are, in general, variable.
Systems can be classified as either homogeneous or heterogeneous. Homogeneous systems consist of entities that are either all crisp or all fuzzy. Heterogeneous systems consist of a mix of crisp and fuzzy entities and thus are always fuzzy. Homogeneous fuzzy systems can be successfully managed. However, the indefinite nature of the membership function of the system can place significant restrictions on the purpose and operational effectiveness of the management capability of the system only homogeneous crisp systems can incorporate all the purposes of their tier one member sets in the overall system purpose and can thus be termed 100% generalized. If system generalization is less than 100%, as must be the case for all systems with one or more fuzzy components, the system is termed more specialized (or less efficient) as judged in relation to design intent.
Management of systems in which there is at least one fuzzy set is an increasingly frequent requirement in both industry and research. In communications, the management of catanets (concatenated networks comprising diverse products, systems and networks from different vendors and based on differing functions, protocols and technologies) is becoming an increasingly common need. It ranges from difficult to impossible to ascertain with any degree of certainty the active membership of a catanet system at any moment in time. Networks may be up or down, nodes may appear or disappear, users may come or go and applications may become active or dormant. Moreover, not all of the anticipated functionality of even active members of a catanet may be accessible at any given time. Any of these factors can turn a system from crisp to fuzzy, with the need to manage fuzzy systems even greater than the need to manage crisp systems.
Software, in general, is fuzzy, especially if not object oriented. Software can have unintentionally fuzzy characteristic, parameter, functionality and purpose sets due to various design inadequacies (bugs).
The Internet is an example of a catanet with a large software based constituency. The Internet can be considered a heterogeneous system because, from a management perspective, the membership functions of the characteristic and parameter sets of at least some entities can be fuzzy at any given time. The only practicable management system for the Internet would have to be highly specialized due to the complexity of the system itself and to the undetermined (or undeterminable) nature of the membership functions for elements of its constituent fuzzy sets of entity characteristics, parameters, functionalities and purposes.
For large, complex and almost unbounded networks (such as the Internet or most intranets) many components can be considered fuzzy, at least while they are passing through interim stages such as logon or logoff between membership and nonmembership. During logon, for example, gateway management is aware that a device is attempting to join as a full network member before the membership is confirmed by authentication procedures. Between the time that the device has made overtures to join the network and the actual acceptance of the device as a full member, its membership is fuzzy. While the device is in a fuzzy state, gateway management can initiate preparations such as an anticipatory user group assignment, virtual communications port assignments, etc. preparatory to having the device join the network as a full member. In a similar way, a device that was formerly a full member of a network, but is awaiting a software load update to bring its functionality up to the network norm, can be considered a fuzzy component as it is fairly close to full membership but is not quite there until its improved functionality software is actually functioning.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,692,106 issued Nov. 25, 1997 to Simon Towers and Paul Mellor discloses a management method and apparatus for computer system tasks and services. An example of a service may be e-mail and tasks related to this services may be installing, configuring and diagnosing and removing faults. To facilitate the carrying out of a range of different types of management tasks in a computer system, declarative models are constructed of the various services provided by the system. These models specify the requirements that need to be met for the corresponding service to be available. These requirements are set out in terms of the system entities that need to be present and the inter-relationships of these entities. In addition, each management task is specified in a corresponding task program in terms of general inferencing operations that can be performed on any of the models. Execution of a particular management task involves carrying out inferencing operations on the appropriate service model in accordance with the task program for the management task under consideration.
In U.S. Pat. No. 5,471,617 issued Nov. 28, 1995 to Scott Farrand et al, A method of managing a plurality of networked manageable devices is disclosed. These networked manageable devices include at least one file server having a system board, a drive array subsystem associated with the file server and a server manager installed in the file server for monitoring the system board from a manager console using a management information base or "MIB". First, second and third pluralities of objects which describe the system board, the drive array subsystem and the server manager, respectively, are collected and assembled into a MIB. The assembled MIB is then used to manage the file server.
In U.S. Pat. No. 5,651,006 issued Jul. 22, 1997 to Shuji Fujino et al, a hierarchical communication network management system comprises a plurality of agents and sub-managers connected to lower communication networks and an integration manager connected to a higher communication network. Each of the sub-managers functions as an agent to the integration manager and functions as a manager to each agent, so that it becomes possible to employ Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) between each agent and its sub-manager and between a sub-manager and the integration manager. Information is collected by managers and stored in a management information base or "MIB".
Unfortunately, the above managers are limited in scope, either to a computer system or to a plurality of networked devices.